


Shipping It

by s0merset



Category: Tiny Meat Gang (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-20
Updated: 2019-05-27
Packaged: 2020-03-08 07:44:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18890227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/s0merset/pseuds/s0merset
Summary: Meta fan fiction. In which Noel discovers Cody x Noel fan fiction, encounters confusing feelings, and Stuff Happens. Slow-ish burn.This is my first fic, so please give me feedback. No need to be gentle.





	1. Chapter 1

Noel was sitting at his desk doing what he always did, which was variously edit and procrastinate. A notification alerted him that it was time to switch to procrastinating: Cody had uploaded another video in his series of reading dirty fan fiction. Noel set out to watch it like he watched all of Cody’s videos because he was the most loyal, thorough kind of collaborator. Noel wasn’t particularly fond of this series. He found it unfunny, played-out as a concept, and low in creative integrity. Not to mention the aspect of the graphic, poorly-written sex involving his closest friend. It just made him squirm. 

The newest episode was much the same as the others: unfunny and sort of hack-ish. Noel actually had to look away from the screen and cover his ears during a few moments. 

The video mercifully reached its end. Noel glanced at the suggestion bar. The first video was the first in the fanfic series, the second was an episode of the Love Island game. He supposed the latter series made Noel guilty of hackery as well, but at least he built characters for that series and wasn’t just reading and reacting to the writings of horny fans. At least that’s what he told himself. He wondered, should he want to make such a fanfic reaction video, if he was even famous enough outside of the context of Cody to have fan fiction written about him.

Indiscreetly following this train of thought, Noel opened up a new google tab. “Noel Miller fan fiction”, he typed. He half expected to see fiction about the late cricket player who shared his name, but no indeed. The very first result to his query was a “Cody Ko x Noel Miller” thread on some platform Noel had never heard of. The next several results followed in a similar vein. Noel rolled his eyes, yet a hard-to-articulate weight formed in his stomach. He checked the clock to ensure Aleena wouldn't be back any time too soon. He followed the first hyperlink. 

Noel felt his jaw slacken at the sheer number of fics that awaited him on the site he entered. They bore titles with varying degrees of cringey-ness. One particularly titillating story was headed by a shopped photo of Cody and him kissing passionately. Noel’s face flushed. He felt the world’s most awkward boner threatening to form. With that, he slammed his computer shut. Ollie started audibly beside the desk. Ordinarily, Noel would apologize to his puppy for frightening him, but he was a bit preoccupied. 

A soft “sugar gay, dude?” in Cody’s voice echoed in the back of Noel’s mind and he smiled weakly. “Right,” Noel said to himself. “This could be joked about.” He cracked his computer back open.

Before he knew it, Noel had read through more than a few stories. Somewhere along the way, his dick had come out. It had also become fully solid. It was also being stroked by his practiced hand. After some time of this, a strangled “fuck” slipped out of his mouth and he came with a sharp grunt and a sigh. And, as often happened to him after jerking it to porn, Noel immediately felt heavy regret. He slammed his computer shut once more. 

“Fuck,” he said again. 

He checked the clock. A full hour had passed since he’d started reading.

***

The next morning was a podcast recording morning. Noel dreaded it. He knew he’d be acting weird, and he knew Cody would notice. He spied Cody’s car on his way in and felt his stomach drop out. He stood outside the studio door and swallowed hard. He unzipped his hoodie, then zipped it up again. Then he just opened the damn door and went inside. 

“Hey dude,” he said. The words tasted stale. Cody looked up from his computer and grinned anyway. 

“Morning,” replied Cody. His face immediately fell. “You good, bro?” 

“Uh,” said Noel with a very dry mouth. He cursed Cody’s power of perception. He couldn’t lie outright. So he told a half-truth. “Just really bad anxiety today, man.” 

Cody closed his laptop. “Wanna talk about it?”

Noel saw the genuine concern in his friend’s eyes. “Not really,” he mumbled. He turned intentionally to put his bag down. He was having a lot of trouble even looking at Cody.

“Totally,” came Cody’s voice. Noel swore he heard a tinge of hurt. 

“Sorry man, it’s not like that,” said Noel, turning back toward his friend. He sat down across from him. “It just hits sometimes. You know how it is.” 

Cody cracked a small smile, apparently convinced enough by Noel’s non-explanation. “Sure.”

The two began setting up to record, even remembering to set a timer. Noel was struggling. He really did have a lot of anxiety symptoms today. He knew it might make him unfunny. His heart rate gradually picked up. 

The recording itself actually went fine. Their ad read even went pretty smoothly. Talking with Cody did have a calming effect on Noel, even under the circumstances. As they packed up, Noel began to get really nervous again. He knew he needed to air what was on his mind. 

“Hey, so,” he began. “Saw your video yesterday.” 

“Oh man,” Cody laughed lightly. “Shit’s wild. Fanfiction’s wack.” He swung his bag over his shoulder.

Noel chuckled uncomfortably. “Yeah,” he agreed. “So, uh. I looked up Noel Miller fan fiction just to see if it even existed.” He picked up his bag to mirror Cody.

“Oh, was it all Cody-Noel fics?” asked Cody. 

“Man, you so about yourself,” Noel said quickly, even though his heart had jumped into his throat. 

Cody laughed fully. “It totally was! Did you read any?”

“I mean yeah.” 

“It was actually hard to find Cody Ko fics with a girl instead of you for that video,” Cody said.

“So you’ve read some Cody-Noel,” Noel stated. His face felt hot. 

“Yeah man. You know I have to read everything with my name in it.”

It was a joke, but Noel didn’t laugh very convincingly in response. He was busy trying not to picture Cody reading the same stories he’d read, the same ones he’d got off to. Noel couldn’t think of anything witty to say.

“First gay porn I ever read,” Cody said. 

Noel looked at his feet. He still couldn’t form words. He could say, “Why would you tell me that?” He could admit, “It wasn’t mine.” He could say anything, really. He just couldn’t make his vocal cords work. 

“Noel?” When he raised his eyes, Cody was looking at him very intently. “Are you actually ok right now?” 

Noel felt extremely exposed. Cody knew him so well that if he opened his mouth to say anything more, Cody would put the pieces together. So he finally found his voice, only to say, “I really gotta go,” and dart out the door.

***

It was 8 that evening. Noel was trying to eat a goddamned boiled chicken breast. He was so sick of chicken breasts. He was sick of eating; all the pleasure had gone out of it on his stupid no-cholesterol diet. His appetite was shot today, besides. 

Noel’s phone vibrated. He didn’t look at it. Aleena was on a plane, so he knew it wasn’t her, and he didn’t have it in him to talk to his friends at the moment, and he was too embarrassed to even think about talking to Cody. He went back to the Hollywood gossip column he’d been reading. 

His phone buzzed again, and now he knew who it was. As it buzzed a third time, Noel picked it up without looking at it and tossed it across the room. This woke up Ollie, who trotted over leapt up on his lap. 

Then his phone started ringing. It stopped, and then started again. 

“NO!” yelled Noel. He placed Ollie on the floor as gently as he could manage in his frustration, then went to grab the phone. Cody’s name lit up the screen, and he hit “decline”. He turned on “do not disturb” and stalked back to the table where his picked-apart chicken lay. 

All at once, there was a banging on the door. “Fuck’s sake,” Noel muttered. He went to open it. There stood Cody in his goofy hoodie, his hair falling out of its gelled coif. 

“Yo so what the fuck,” Cody demanded.

“Cody, now’s not a great time—“

“No no no no,” said the white boy as he barged in and snapped shut the door. “Look, I’m not gonna like take up your whole night of being depressed and listening to early 2000’s hip hop and jacking off or whatever the fuck, but you gotta tell me what that was this morning.” 

“It was nothing, I really just had to leave,” Noel insisted.

“Ok fine, but you’ve been ignoring me all day. Like actually ignoring me. Not like you were busy or you had your phone off. Like you actively dodged me all day.” Cody was getting into his space pretty significantly.

“I’m allowed, homie,” said Noel, feeling a flare of anger as Cody got too close. “Sometimes it feels like I’m married to you. Sometimes I need space.”

“That’s not what this is about. You ask for space when you need it. You were cold to me from minute one this morning. Anxious or not, you’re never like that. If you’re pissed at me, you have to explain why. I’m stupid. You have to break it down for me.”

“You’re not stupid.” 

“Man, how is that ALL you heard!” cried Cody, putting his hands on his head. 

Noel’s heart was pounding again. He breathed deeply. “I’m not pissed at you,” he said quietly. “It’s actually way worse.”

“What the FUCK,” Cody spat. “Can you just talk like a person and explain?”

“It was hot, Cody. Those stories? Those Noel Miller Cody Ko stories? I read them and I thought they were hot. And now I feel really weird about myself. Ok? I can’t look at you the same. It’s my bad for being a dick, but I bet you didn’t actually want to know that, did you?”

Cody was silent. He lowered his hands to his sides.

“Can you please just go?” Noel practically whispered. His face burned and his hands were cold. 

“Noel…” 

“Look, just go home to Kelsey,” said Noel. It came out much crueler and more bitter than he had intended.

“Can we just talk for a sec?” 

“What is there to talk about, dude? I’m a dumb horny fucker who was turned on by bad smut about my best friend. You don’t have to berate me or belittle me or whatever. I feel bad enough about it, ok?”

“I’m not mad.” Cody spoke earnestly. “I’m not grossed out. Sexy stuff is sexy. It just seems like maybe we should unpack this.” 

Noel was silent now. 

“Look man, we work together everyday, and we have to be able to talk. But also, you’re my best friend, and I need you to not pull away like that. No matter what. We have to talk about this.” 

“Cody,” Noel croaked, “I jacked off to it.”

The two men just looked at each other. The air was heavy with no words. 

Finally, Cody said, “Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“That’s… Oh.”

“Yeah.”

Noel waited for Cody’s derision, but it didn’t come. That almost made it worse. Cody standing there, his forehead lightly creased, saying nothing at all… It was somehow more humiliating than anything he could have expected. 

“Can you please go?” Noel repeated for the third time. “We can talk later, just…”

This time Cody obliged. He strode across the foyer and left without a word.


	2. Chapter 2

Cody was out of breath. He unlocked the door to his apartment and flung himself into the first chair he came to, which was Kelsey’s office chair. The force almost toppled it, but he could not bring himself to care. He leaned back with his hands on his face. 

“Shit,” he said aloud. 

His brain was firing much, much faster than normal. It hurt a little bit. 

Noel’s admission had floored Cody. It wasn't gross so much as it was unsettling. It was fan fiction. Fan fiction. Random strangers grasping at the threads of his own life, weaving a distorted, often disturbing picture. And Noel had gotten off to it. To him, or a fabricated version of him. He wanted to be nauseated by it. But he honestly wasn’t. Because he remembered finding such fan fiction. He remembered how it made him picture Noel and himself together for the first time, and how that felt. 

It really had been the first gay porn Cody had ever encountered on purpose. He had no expectations going in. He was reading it for a video, anyway. But the first fic he read stirred something in him. The scene in which he and Noel had their first kiss made him blush. He had to stop reading, but not because the writing was even bad on this one. He couldn’t explain it. He was shaken. 

And that’s when Cody started picturing them together. 

It was a slow process, like he was a teenager discovering sex. He got the biggest rush from even thinking about kissing Noel, imagining how his lips would feel. When he first pictured those same lips around his cock, he was shocked with himself, but his heart pounded and he started to get hard. Then he immediately queued up some lesbian video he’d seen a thousand times on PornHub. 

So now, Cody didn’t know what to think. 

If Noel thought about them together too, then maybe it was just a normal guy thing, Cody conjectured. He shook his head. He’d never had these thoughts with other guys. Something else was going on here. He rubbed his face.

At this moment, Kelsey walked out of the bathroom and popped out her AirPods. Cody stood up and turned off his brain.

***

Two weeks passed. The pair worked together every weekday for several hours, but hadn’t talked any further on the matter. There was tension for the first time in their friendship; all their interactions off-camera were strained to some extent. It was painful for both men. Unfortunately, they were leaving for tour very soon, a tour on which they’d be in very close proximity almost nonstop for a month. 

The problems between the two were unbeknownst to their friends, of course, so Spock saw fit to have a small but very festive party two nights before tour began. “So you can have a day to recover,” he explained to Cody. 

Cody was exceedingly nervous. He and Kelsey had showed before almost anyone else, and Cody was struggling to make small talk. Lucky for him, there was always an inordinate amount of alcohol at Spock’s, and this night was no exception. Cody pounded a beer almost as soon as he could make it to the cooler. 

Noel and Aleena arrived almost a full hour later, at which point Cody was thoroughly sauced. From across the lowly-lit room, Cody drank in Noel, and his heartbeat quickened. Noel wore all black and appeared to have a fresh fade. He accepted a drink from Sam. He looked over at Cody, raised his glass, and half-smiled. Cody waved, and instantly felt like an idiot. 

Noel didn’t even try to come over and talk to him. 

At some point in the evening, Spock called a toast in honor of Cody and Noel. He herded the two into the center of the room. Noel said a few words which Cody couldn’t process them very easily. Cody also said a few words which were supposed to be along the lines of “Thank you all for supporting us and our creative endeavors, and thank you to Spock for the lovely evening”, but the words didn’t come out particularly well. Everyone cheered and drank anyway. Cody looked at his beautiful, sweaty, booze-stinking friend and wanted to throw up. Noel caught his eye, though, and pulled him in for a hug. 

Then, as they pulled apart, like a teenager who didn't know his limits, Cody did throw up.

***

This time, it was Noel who showed up to Cody’s door unprompted. It was the next morning. Cody’s head pounded angrily at the sound of knocking. 

Noel stepped across the threshold and brushed past Cody as soon as the door swung open. 

“Bruh,” said Cody, unable to do much else.

“We need to talk right now,” said Noel simply. “Is Kelsey in?”

“I think she left with someone else last night,” Cody admitted. “Sam took me home.”

Noel opened his mouth to speak but didn’t seem know what to say. 

“We have an agreement,” Cody explained. 

“I uh… ok.” Noel shook his head as if to clear it. “Look man, we need to talk,” he repeated. He took Cody by the arm and sat him down in an armchair. Noel sat across from him on the couch. 

The two of them just looked at each other. Cody’s mind had gone blank. 

Finally, Noel said, “I’m really sorry I crossed a line the other day. It was messed up. I shouldn’t have told you about it, and I never should have done it in the first place. And I shouldn’t have been cold to you. It’s all my bad. I acknowledge that. But we can’t work like this, man. I know things probably can’t go back to how they were, but we’re about to be on top of each other for the next month, and we have to be able to talk. What can I do to make you comfortable enough to be around me without puking?”

Cody couldn’t help but chuckle at the last line. As for the rest of Noel’s speech, it broke his heart. “You don’t need to be sorry,” he said. 

“I definitely do. And I am.” 

“No,” he said. “You don’t. I could have just acted normal toward you and I didn’t.”

“You’re allowed to be grossed out or whatever.”

Cody gripped Noel’s knee. Noel looked at Cody’s hand, then met his eyes. The pain Cody saw was gut-wrenching. “I’m not”, he confessed. 

“You don’t have to lie.”

Cody stood and leaned Noel so their faces were inches apart. “I’m. Not.”

Noel was very still. He studied his friend’s features. Cody’s brow was lightly creased like it had been that night. It clicked, and Noel’s breath hitched in his chest. He closed his eyes. 

Cody closed the space between them. Noel’s lips were soft, like a girl’s. (Cody didn’t know what he’d expected.) They were full and warm. The bristles of Noel’s weak-ass mustache made him smile into the kiss. 

They broke apart. Cody sported the silliest smile Noel had ever seen. Not understanding at all what was going on, Noel laughed, and reached for Cody’s face to pull him in again.


	3. Chapter 3

Noel didn’t even know what state they were in. It seemed like they were still in the Midwest, probably. Rural and cold. The bus had pulled in to a 24-hour truck-fueling station, and Noel, who hadn’t been sleeping in the first place, clambered out of his minuscule bunk to get some air. 

A hand grabbed his wrist as he made his way out of the sleeping quarters. It was Cody, of course, his arm the only thing protruding from his mountain of covers, aside from a shock of hair. Noel wondered absently how Cody’d known it was him.

“Where y’going?” came Cody’s muffled sleep-voice. 

“Out,” Noel whispered. 

The blanket mound stirred and Cody emerged. “Me too,” he said too loudly. He realized his lack of volume awareness and whispered an apology. He grabbed a fleece throw and stood into his Slides. 

Squinting in the blaze of gas station lights, they exited the bus. The pair nodded hellos to the driver and some crew who stood at the pump shooting the breeze. Their breath rose in great plumes. Noel surveyed the surrounding world. Turning away from the service station, he saw they were up on a hill overlooking the freeway. There were no streetlights, but he could see the lights of a very few cars and trucks. One section of the sky glowed faintly behind some hills as if a town lay just beyond. The rest of the sky was clear and very starry. There was no moon. Noel started to their left, into unknown blackness. Cody shuffled close behind.

They stepped from pavement onto a crust of melted-and-frozen snow. A few strides and they were surrounded by silhouettes of tree trunks. 

“Uh, I don’t like the woods,” Cody whispered. 

“Why are you whispering,” said Noel. “Also, you didn’t have to come.”

“Oh yeah,” said Cody at full volume, still clearly half-asleep. “But I wanted to come.” Noel rolled his eyes and trudged forward. Cody picked up his pace so he was practically on top of him. He grabbed the tail of Noel’s shirt. “But it’s spooky.”

Noel stopped and turned around. Cody was lit from behind by the brilliant lights of the station, wrapped in his blanket like a child. Noel’s chest fluttered with what he vaguely recognized as affection. He shook his head and gave a single chuckle. “You idiot.” He took his hand out of his pocket and held it out. Cody took it without hesitation. Noel’s throat went dry as their fingers interlaced. 

He meant to keep walking, but instead stood still, letting his eyes adjust to the dark. It was very quiet. The snow muffled the intermittent whizzing of cars in the valley as well as the voices of their colleagues a few hundred feet away. Noel began to see his friend’s face better. He saw the light reflecting off his eyelashes. What a weird thing to notice first. He saw Cody’s mouth parted open, producing a haze of steam with each breath. He cast his eyes down, remembering the moments in Cody’s living room right before tour. His heart pounded. They still hadn’t really discussed what the hell was going on with them. “Let’s go, buddy,” Noel said, turning his body to continue into the woods. Cody’s grip on his hand tightened. 

Presently, they came to a small clearing where the ground glowed blue in the starlight. They looked up to where the skeletal tree branches crisscrossed and then opened to the pinpricked sky. It was dark enough here that hey could even see a misty arm of the milky way.

“Damn.” Cody was whispering again. “That’s beautiful.” 

It was. Noel didn’t like how beautiful it was, standing holding hands with his big dumb white frat boy jock best friend in the middle of the dark winter woods by a gas station in middle America. Cody’s thumb circled lightly on his palm. His pulse quickened in a distinctly non-platonic way. They faced each other. 

Then they were kissing again, heavily this time. Cody’s arms snaked round his waist, wrapping them both in that stupid fleece blanket. His mouth was hot in the biting cold. Noel gasped as he felt their erections brushing through the sparse layers of flannel and cotton. 

“You ok?” Cody rumbled in his ear. Noel gasped again at the sensation. 

“Yeah, I just. Uh, I just never felt another dick before. On my dick. Or like at all.”

Cody nodded. “I think it’s kinda nice,” he said. 

Noel laughed breathlessly at the seriousness in Cody’s voice. “Yeah, me too.” He lowered his hands to Cody’s ass and pulled him as close as he would come. Cody’s tongue was in his mouth, and their hips ground together in fervent rhythm. Noel was surprised by how vocal Cody was, with light moans and whines at each stroke.

Cody had Noel pushed against a tree, hand on his waistband, when, as if from miles away, shouts of “Boys!” and “Time to hit the road!” rang through the woods. The two men sprang apart. They sprinted back the way they had come so their heavy breathing wouldn’t seem too suspect.


End file.
